Method and apparatus for multi-antenna transmission to minimize charging time of users in wireless powered communication network

Abstract

Provided is a method and apparatus for multi-antenna transmission to minimize a charging time of users in a wireless powered communication network. A power transmission apparatus may be configured to generate a covariance matrix to minimize a charging time of the power reception apparatus based on an amount of energy required by at least one power reception apparatus; to derive a beamforming vector using the covariance matrix; and to transmit a wireless power to the power reception apparatus based on the beamforming vector.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION[0001]This application claims the priority benefit of Korean Patent Application No. 10-2018-0165192, filed on Dec. 19, 2018, in the Korean Intellectual Property Office, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.BACKGROUND1. Field of the Invention[0002]The following description of example embodiments relates to a method and apparatus for multi-antenna transmission to minimize a charging time of users in a wireless powered communication network.2. Description of the Related Art[0003]With the current growing interest in Internet of things (loT) communication and a sensor network, a number of electronic devices, for example, a smartphone and the like, significantly increases in a network and a battery charging has also become an issue accordingly. A wired charging method may easily charge a relatively small number of electronic devices, however, may be inconvenient to charge a large number of electronic devices in loT communication...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

This approach significantly reduces the charging time of power reception apparatuses by optimizing energy beamforming, achieving efficient energy transfer and overcoming the limitations of existing wireless charging methods, as demonstrated by the comparison with other energy beamforming methods.

Problems solved by technology

With the current growing interest in Internet of things (loT) communication and a sensor network, a number of electronic devices, for example, a smartphone and the like, significantly increases in a network and a battery charging has also become an issue accordingly.

A wired charging method may easily charge a relatively small number of electronic devices, however, may be inconvenient to charge a large number of electronic devices in loT communication and a sensor network since a single wired charger is required for each electronic device.

Accordingly, high operation cost is required to periodically replace a battery of each electronic device or charge each electronic device with a wired charger.

Dissimilar to the wired charging method, a wireless charging method may reduce inconvenience and operation cost in a network in which a charging demand is suddenly increasing.

However, the current wireless charging method has a relatively low charging efficiency compared to the wired charging method.

However, the RF signal-based wireless power transmission has a limitation in that an amount of energy charged in an electronic device is small due to loss of a propagation path over a distance and a degradation in efficiency during a rectification process.

However, while a wireless communication system aims to control inter-user interference using a beamforming method to improve a transmission rate, a wireless powered communication network aims to achieve energy charging instead of improving the transmission rate.

Compared to an information receiver, an energy charging receiver has a relatively high hardware sensitivity and thus, it may be difficult to directly apply the beamforming method used for the information transmission.

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